The stock market is made up of exchanges, like the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq. Stocks are listed on a specific exchange, which brings buyers and sellers together and acts as a market for the shares of those stocks. The exchange tracks the supply and demand — and directly related, the price — of each stock. (Need to back up a bit? Read our explainer about stocks.)
It allows companies to raise money by offering stock shares and corporate bonds. It lets common investors participate in the financial achievements of the companies, make profits through capital gains, and earn money through dividends, although losses are also possible. While institutional investors and professional money managers do enjoy some privileges owing to their deep pockets, better knowledge and higher risk taking abilities, the stock market attempts to offer a level playing field to common individuals.
Regarding your private keys, can either keep them on a software wallet, or on a hardware wallet. The software wallet is the easiest way for beginners, but it implies that you have a computer that is properly secured (strong password, antivirus etc.) and that you do backups of your data. Remember, if you lose your private keys, the money is gone forever. As you get into cryptocurrencies more seriously, you will inevitably look for a hardware wallet, which is a dedicated device resistant to hacking where you can store your private keys (or to say it in an easy way, your crypto assets/invested money). I have already written an article on a hardware wallet, the TREZOR (see here). The most common wallets are the TREZOR and the Ledger Nano S. The TREZOR has a new model being sold from January 2018 (Model T) which will support much more currencies than the current TREZOR. The Ledger Nano S has more integrations currently, but I would recommend to wait for the TREZOR T to judge properly. Those devices usually cost around 100 USD, so once you have more than 100 USD to protect it starts making sense to get one.
It came out of the Great Recession, however, and that’s how bulls and bears tend to go: Bull markets are followed by bear markets, and vice versa, with both often signaling the start of larger economic patterns. In other words, a bull market typically means investors are confident, which indicates economic growth. A bear market shows investors are pulling back, indicating the economy may do so as well.
While most online brokers do not offer international trading, some do. Nearly every broker supports trading American depositary receipts (ADRs), which offers US investors an easy, simple way to invest in foreign companies. However, if you want to buy physical shares of an international company, then you need to do your research. Interactive Brokers is the leader in this space but is built for professionals. For casual investing, both Fidelity and Charles Schwab offer international stock trading.
The challenge with Bitcoin and Ethereum these days is two-fold: first of all, both networks are congested with very high utilisation. How does that impacts us? Congestion means that there are more transactions to be processed than the system can actually ingest, which leads into transaction queuing. This means that those transactions will go in a wait list to be mined, and that means that it can take at least 20 minutes to a few hours for your transaction to be confirmed – a confirmation meaning that the transaction has been validated in at least one block. Going with BTC or LTC may result in longer times to get your money effectively transferred from one place to the other (for example if you want to store it securely on your wallet, or if you need to send it to an exchange). For transaction speed I prefer to go with Litecoin at the moment, except in cases where Bitcoin is still more advantageous. Keep in mind that despite the huge transaction fees Bitcoin sees massive adoption and has the first comer advantage.
In most cases, your broker will charge a commission every time that you trade stock, either through buying or selling. Trading fees range from the low end of $2 per trade but can be as high as $10 for some discount brokers. Some brokers charge no trade commissions at all, but they make up for it in other ways. There are no charitable organizations running brokerage services.
Market Depth – the Market Depth view shows the total cumulated offer and demand for a given cryptocurrency. This is the place where we can identify the « sell walls » I was talking about in a previous section. A market that is not manipulated (or at least not overtly) will have a stair-shaped graph on both sizes, with people willing to buy or sell at different values.

Alternatively, you may be looking at digging hidden gems that may be well below the top 50 or top 100 projects, but still have a very solid technology or are undervalued. Doing your own research may help here, but of course it will require more investment and time spent, with a possibly longer ROI (Return on Investment) but the hope of higher gains.

We hope that this beginner stock market investing guide sets you on a good path towards further research and learning, investment success and profits. It really is possible to be a successful investor if you want to be, but it will take time, effort, dedication and patience. If you can find those within yourself and treat investing as a journey that will take years, you can do it too.
What would make me sell: Sometimes there are good reasons to split up. For this part of your journal, compose an investing prenup that spells out what would drive you to sell the stock. We’re not talking about stock price movement, especially not short term, but fundamental changes to the business that affect its ability to grow over the long term. Some examples: The company loses a major customer, the CEO’s successor starts taking the business in a different direction, a major viable competitor emerges, or your investing thesis doesn’t pan out after a reasonable period of time.